News for Thursday, 22 March 2007

ASUS, as many other manufacturers, announced the availability of a transmitter able to relay wirelessly HDMI video streams. The system consists of 2 boxes equipped with 2 antennas each and supports all video streaming from 408i to 1080p. If such system already exist as TV relay, they do not support video HD. The price and the range remain unknown, but competition among manufacturers will bring production cost down.
So, the Apple TV might quickly face a serious competitor with those HDMI video transmitters; as it requires a computer to purchase and encode video contents; in addition it only support 720p HD video.
Apple might have to react quickly, unlocking some features already present in its TV box or already prepare the rev 2 to bring support for 1080p (components Inside are able to deliver 1080p). As the Apple TV runs OSX it should be possible to get it working quickly as a small independent digital hub.

Elton John wanted to go online for its music catalog, consisting of over 30 albums covering about 40 years of his musical career. So the partnership gives the exclusive availability on Apple iTunes Store from March 26th through April 30. Later on, Elton John.
It will be interesting to evaluate the real success of this campaign as most Elton John's fans already have albums as CDs since years, and have probably encoded their collection for years.

According to some rumors, Vodafone might be leading in its fight with Orange to have the "iPhone exclusivity" in Europe.
Maybe the first real sign of this rumor could be find in France, as SFR, the local Vodafone partner, has published an article on the iPhone in its free magazine distributed to its consumers:

Translation of the last sentence: Available in France in 2008, the 4GB version will be offered via subscription for 499 Euros, while the 8GB model will cost 599 Euros, depending on the final referencing of this product.
We can not really imagine the french carrier to provide such information and start the promotion of this product if they do not know already that they will be able to offer it to consumers.